The future of the urban environment is set to be debated in Doha next month with the major theme being smart cities.

Sustainable design will also be on the agenda at the event which takes place at the Ritz-Carlton, Doha, on April 13-14.

The 4th Annual Arab Future Cities Summit Qatar is sponsored by Microsoft and held under the patronage of the Ministry of Municipality and Urban Planning, State of Qatar.

Among the topics to be addressed will be “citizen empowerment in the context of smart cities”.

Microsoft will also showcase its CityNext programme which focuses on four major technology trends—big data, cloud, mobile, and social—in public sector industries such as education, government, health, and public safety).

Ali Nimer of Microsoft Gulf will be speaking at the summit on “Doha Next: Enabling Real Impact for Better Tomorrow.”

He said: “We are fully committed to supporting governments in this region with their transition from resource-based to a knowledge-based economy.

“Our participation in the Arab Future Cities Summit last year facilitated valuable connections with key stakeholders from the Public and Commercial Sectors, and provided us with the proper platform to discuss Microsoft’s CityNext Initiative which offers cutting-edge technologies as well as innovative and holistic solutions that can make this transition happen.”